#oneword2019

Good morning colleagues! Welcome back to 2019!

For the last two years, I've picked one word to be my focus. I am planning on doing the same this year. The word that I am choosing is habitual. I am picking this word, not for my professional life, but for my personal life. This is an individual goal to me because I've found me telling myself, over and over, that teaching is what I do... it is not who I am. It is part of me, but it can't be all of me.

WHY do I need to be habitual? Most of my friends here in the Springs are teachers. When we get together, we talk about school. After a while, that gets old. There is more to us than being a teacher. We all have lives outside of the building, and we most certainly have more to us than teaching (or at least I hope so). Two years ago, I chose self-care as my word, and I've been preaching self-care ever since. I've done a great job of breaking apart my two worlds, but I need to be better about my personal, non-professional life.

Over the last year, as my job slowed down tremendously, I realized I still had an imbalance. I was still tired all of the time and spent all of my free time watch tv and/or lounging on the couch. I was in a funk and was practicing some bad habits. I didn't like that I was a couch potato, especially since I'm more than just my lousy TV habits.

HOW will I be habitual? Last year, I tried to pick up bullet journaling, but I went about it all the wrong way. I didn't have the right tools to make it enjoyable, and I didn't have the right frame of mind to be successful. What I knew of bullet journals is that they were pretty. I don't have time to MAKE MY BULLET JOURNAL PRETTY! So I went into this with a different frame of mind... it had to be what I needed it to be.

My sister was SO excited when I asked for bullet journaling supplies for Christmas. She bought me the stuff that she thought I needed (she did a good job!) but then kept asking me if I was going to use my bullet journal as a planner. The answer was definitely "NO!" I don't need a planner. I'm tied to my phone, and I live and die by Google Calendar. I'm really good at putting in reminders and dates, and I have notifications pop up consistently throughout the day (both on my personal phone and my school computer). So I knew that bullet journaling would become a pain as a planner.

I decided that I wanted my bullet journal to become a habit tracker. I didn't want a digital habit tracker because I didn't think it would keep me accountable. I need to write out my ideas and look at the trackers every day.

1. The first page of each month is a calendar. I highlight important days (no school, birthdays, hockey games, etc.) which match to their respective color on my phone calendar. It's just a visual reminder that I have something going on. I also have a goal list for the month and a to-do list for the month (make a car appointment, buy a birthday card, etc.)
2. The second page is my habit tracker. I have seven habits that I want to keep up with consistently: take pictures, practice handwriting, read for 30 minutes, post on Instagram, practice the ukelele, color for fun, and exercise. I've listed out the days of the month and then color in the box for the day if I practice the habit. 
3. The third page is a cleaning tracker. I love to cook, but hate all other household chores. It's also embarrassing when my husband tells people how he keeps the house clean... not me. So similar to my habit tracker, I've listed out the days of the month and color in the box for the day if I clean. I've listed out the following "chores": dishes, sweep and wash floors, pick up clutter, do laundry, put clothes away, vacuum downstairs, clean my bathroom. 
4. The fourth page is a mood tracker. Sometimes my mood swings wildly from morning to afternoon, so I want to track how I'm feeling (to better understand why I might be feeling a specific mood). I have a key with a color equaling a particular feeling, and I track AM and PM how I'm feeling each day. 
5. My last page of the month is a gratitude log. This is what I started doing last year but tried to get all fancy with it. Instead, it's a short and quick reminder of good things that happened that day. Even on a bad day, there's always a positive. 

So how is bullet journaling going? Not bad. I still have bad habits that I'm trying to break, but as James Clear mentions, I will again go back to bad habits for some time. It doesn't happen overnight. Bad habits occur because of stress and boredom. Now that I'm back in school, I'm stressed, but then I find myself bored. What do I do in those instances? Play a stupid game on my phone that I'm ridiculously addicted to for no good reason!

I do have my phone notifying me twice a day to check my bullet journal, so that is holding me accountable for looking at it every day (making it a habit). I also put app timers on my phone so that I don't spend all of my free time on Ramsay Dash, Reddit, and Twitter. My husband told me to leave my ukelele and coloring books on the couch, so they are in my face when I'm a couch potato. 

I'm hoping, by picking habitual as my word of the year, that I will have more to talk about when I'm with other people. I can talk about the new photos I took last weekend and can show them the final versions on Instagram. I can use coloring as a destresser after an unusually long day. I can tell people that I can play the ukelele which makes me seem "cool and interesting." And, of course, my final hope is my house will be clean because of me!

I know this post was incredibly personal (and not really related to education at all), but I appreciate you making it to the end. Thanks for reading! I'll see you next week :)

- Rachel

@historicalipad
My Teacherspayteachers website

Personality tests

Hello colleagues! So I have a random story to tell you to start the blog this week. I was scrolling on Twitter not long ago when I saw my high school best friend post about her personality type. I've taken personality tests in the past, but I figured I was due for an upgrade. Turns out that I have the exact same personality type as her, INFJ. In the Myers-Briggs personality assessment, INFJ stands for introverted, intuitive, feeling, judging.

I used a website called 16 Personalities for my "assessment." I don't usually push sites like this, but there is a reason that this website is the first Google search result! The personality descriptions are quite descriptive, and I must say, spot on. When I read through my personality type, my jaw kept hitting the floor. My husband was trying to watch baseball, and I kept interrupting him to talk about my personality and all of the things I was learning about myself! It's like someone had finally unlocked my brain code. Apparently, INFJs are the rarest personality type which explains why I've felt so isolated my entire life!

Some of my personality strengths include

• creativity (I'm pretty good at thinking outside the box)
• decisiveness (ask me a question, and I'll give you a definitive answer. Where are we going to eat? Done.)
• determined (hello magical word that I chose for myself during Path2Empathy)
• altruistic (I don't care about money, fame, and power. I want everyone to be better). 

Weaknesses?

• I'm private (You don't need to know about me - apparently other people don't feel that way!)
• sensitive (Did I take my no crying pills today?)
• perfectionist (HELLO)
• can burn out quickly (Why were the last five years so hard?! I did it to myself). 

While reading through my INFJ personality, I realized why I'd felt so misunderstood here at Skyview and how I just wanted my job to have meaning. I want people to be better because I think we, as teachers, can make a difference.

So, what's the point of this blog. Am I just talking about myself here?

Giving the kids the Myers-Briggs assessment is the perfect way to start the school year (a little late... I know!). Giving the students a personality test isn't new or innovative, but I wish I had done THIS assessmet with my students every year. Knowing my little type A self, I would have put together a Google Sheet with students' names and personalities. This would have helped me better approach students. I could have better through through my groupings and team "jobs," and I could have pushed my students towards a certain set of occupations. Also, I want all of my colleagues to take the personality test so that I can learn a little more about them. I want to have better collegial relationships, especially in this new role.

I did, earlier today, ask some of my close colleagues to take the Myers-Briggs assessment, and you know what? I learned a lot about some of my closest friends (and even sisters). Some of their strengths and weaknesses were not surprising (because I know them well), but some made me look differently at my friends and family. I guess I just enjoy learning more about people. Is that part of my personality type? :)

Thanks for reading. And if you want to know a little more about yourself (I see you teachers... I know you will), TAKE THE QUIZ. I'll see you next week :)

- Rachel

@historicalipad

My Teacherspayteachers website

Give the kids homework this weekend...

Did I get your attention? Did you click on this article because you saw the title and felt like you needed to argue with me? Good. So here's what I'm talking about.

As a broadcasting teacher, I want students to tell stories. I want them to report news stories, I want them to design creative stories, and I want them to figure a way to make people connect to others' stories. To help students tell stories, I have to know how to tell stories as well. I try to tell stories through my photography. Because I've been a photographer for so long, I'm constantly looking around me for the stories I want to tell. If you're not observing your world, you'll miss it.

How else do I tell stories? Snapchat.

Yes, seriously guys. I use Snapchat. And I LOVE IT! My favorite social media app? Snapchat. I wish more of my friends and family had Snapchat. It's probably because I think I'm funnier than I actually am. But I love letting people see small glimpses into my world. I used to love Facebook because it was people sharing pictures and videos of their lives. That is why I love Snapchat today.

What is Snapchat? It is a messaging app that sends only pictures and videos in which you can add filters and text to the image. You can decide how long people can see the picture (up to 10 seconds) and you determine who you send the picture to. You can also create a story where people can view the image/video an unlimited number of times for 24 hours. To find a friend (or vice versa), you have to have their cell phone number or their username.

Snapchat got quite a bad rap when it first began because the users were using the app to send explicit pictures. I feel like that's changed since its infancy, but then again, my friends aren't like that and I don't add random strangers to my account.

So how do I use Snapchat to tell stories?
This is my cat Ombre. He loves going outside, but he also likes climbing trees to chase squirrels. In the past, he will come running to the door when it opens, and it's often hilarious. I KNEW he was going to jump when I came to the door, so I had my camera ready for filming. When I didn't know is that he was on the dining room table. As I'm walking towards the door, he jumped really far from the table to the door and jumped as high as he could (we've seen him jump five feet high before). I added text to the screen which Ombre "bumped" so it just added more humor to the video. After I took this video I was laughing SO hard. It just sums up my cat in 10 seconds.

So, back to the original topic of this post - give your kids homework this weekend. Have them use Snapchat (or the video/camera feature on a device, or even have them draw if they don't have a device) and have them tell a story about their weekend or their life. Take the first 2 minutes of the day for five days and have the students share their stories. You learn more about the students and they learn more about each other. Isn't that how you build a community in your classroom?

Thanks for reading. I'll see you next week :)

- Rachel

@historicalipad

My Teacherspayteachers website

Again, I think I'm funny. Here is a taste of my Snapchat feed...

#currently

Greetings colleagues!

I was browsing Feedly when I stumbled across a post from Katie, a 7th grade English teacher, talking about what you are currently listening to, eating, etc. I thought this would make for an interesting post!

Reading: The Girl who Came Home: I'm only about a third of the way through this, but it's an interesting concept. There are two plotlines intertwined. The first part is a flashback to 1912 as a young Irish woman, Maggie, travels on the Titanic to the United States. She is joining family there and is planning on starting a better life. The second plot line deals with her great-granddaughter Grace in the "present-day" of 1982. I don't regularly read many non-fiction history texts during the school year as I deal with history every day. It is, however, a nice change of pace to read historical fiction that is well-written.

Watching: I just finished both Big Little Lies and got caught up on Game of Thrones, so I'm in a post-tv watching funk! I need to get caught up on season nine of Doctor Who before season ten starts in a few weeks!

Eating: It's 9:45 am Mountain time, so I just ate my "go-to" breakfast: southwestern eggs, rice, Cholula, mustard, avocado, and a little bit of cheese. It's my go-to breakfast because I can make it quickly, it's filling, and it tastes good (at least to my tastebuds).

Listening: As I'm blogging, I'm listening to my movie score soundtrack. Whenever I do anything school related, I cannot listen to anything with words. I'm too observant to not pay attention to my surroundings, so it either has to be silent where I am working, or the only sound is music with no words!

Loving: I recently bought a Charge 2 Fitbit, and I am LOVING it! I had a Fitbit in the past, but it was part of the recall because many people (including myself) were burned by the material. So I switched to a Garmin Vivofit. I've had it for the last three years, so I wanted something new and flashy! It is more interactive, plus the Fitbit community is pretty impressive. I have many friends here and family back home that have them, so we're in constant competition with each other. I enjoy the continuous heart rate monitor, the silent reminders (including a move reminder every hour), and that I can start different types of workouts (hikes, yoga, treadmill, weights).

Planning: One thing that I'm planning right now is getting my master's degree. I am still in the early stages, but I know I want my masters in educational/instructional technology. It just makes sense based on where I am in my career, where my focus has been the last couple of years, and where I see myself headed in the future.

Waiting: I am currently waiting on May 25th. This is not because it is my last day of school, but it's because it is the day my nephew is graduating from high school! My school district believes in family first, so I was hesitant to ask to be absent for the last two days of school. That is usually a big "no no" in school districts, but I was pleasantly surprised that my principal was supportive of my absence. I am quite excited to head back to Iowa and see my family, and celebrate with them for four days!

So there you go - you just got a little insight into my #currently moments! Thanks for reading. I'll see you next week :)

- Rachel

@historicalipad

My Teacherspayteachers website